General election latest: Starmer to aim speech at undecided voters as he insists he ‘changed’ Labour

In a keynote speech ahead of polling day, Sir Keir Starmer will try to persuade undecided voters to come on board Labour as he will insist his party has “changed”.

Acknowledging that some voters are still unsure of whether Labour could be trusted on national security, he is expected to say some people are “fed up with the failure, chaos and division of the -Tories but they still have questions about us”.

“Has Labour changed enough? Do I trust them with my money, our borders and our security? My answer is yes you can – because I have changed this party. Permanently. This has been my driving mission since day one. I was determined to change Labour so that it could serve the British people.”

Nigel Farage signalled a return to right-wing shock tactics for his Reform UK party, as he used his first election interview to attack Muslims in the UK for “not sharing British values”.

Speaking to Sir Trevor Phillips on Sky News this morning, Mr Farage accused Rishi Sunak of “not being a leader” and instead being “a follower of focus groups” who is “not willing to tackle the real issues in this country”.

He was dismissive of Tory plans to reintroduce compulsory national service for school leavers, describing the policy as “a joke” but then stunned Sir Trevor by launching into an attack on millions of voters.

Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said Sir Keir Starmer “would do everything within his power to keep our country safe” if he becomes prime minister.

She was addressing a report from the Times that a Labour government would bring together MI5, police and Whitehall departments to carry out a 100-day review of all the threats that Britain faces, including from Russia and Iran.

Ms Phillipson told Times Radio the decision was “about demonstrating the priority that we would attach to (security) because if we were to form the next government, we would very rapidly want to undertake a full review of the security risks and national security threats our country is facing at the moment because we know how important it is to the British people to know that we have a government focused on keeping them safe”.

Foreign Office minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan said a “very small proportion” of British Muslims wanted to “challenge” the country’s fundamental values.

She told LBC Radio: “The vast proportion of British Muslims are wonderful, peace-loving, community-minded people, certainly in the North East where I’m based, we have fantastic communities and they are a really important part of our social fabric.

“There are a very small proportion for whom they want to challenge those values that we hold dear in the UK, which are British values, and there we need to continue to work in community to bring those people to this.

“The UK has incredible values of freedom of speech, freedom of choice … these are incredibly important values, but they have to be nurtured and looked after, and where there are those who would threaten them we need to make sure that we deal with that.”

She was speaking after Reform UK’s honorary president Nigel Farage said there was a “growing number of young people in this country who do not subscribe to British values and “loathe much of what we stand for”.

Foreign Office minister Ann Marie Trevelyan indicated this morning that the plans to introduce National Service for school leavers was to help prepare the UK for war or other disasters.

She told Radio 4’s Today programme: “I am a Foreign Office minister so I spend my life talking to people and visiting around the world. And the world is a very unstable place. Not a reassuring pace at all.

“We need our young people to understand and be part of our communities, our incredible country that is the UK, but also making sure they have the skills and resilience because we need a secure future for our country because the world is not a safe place and freedom does not come for free.

“We need to make sure we have the skills that we need.”

Sir Ed Davey has said the Liberal Democrats are getting the best response from voters “for a generation” ahead of the General Election.

The party leader also criticised the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt and other Conservative MPs for taking their constituents “for granted”.

Speaking at the Lib Dems’ campaign launch in Cambridgeshire, Sir Ed told the PA news agency: “I’m not putting a ceiling on our ambitions.

“All I’m doing is talking to voters with my teams across the country, and the Liberal Democrats are getting a great response – a better response than we’ve had for a generation.

“I was elected back in 1997 and this feels to me quite a bit like that. I don’t worry about the other parties, I’m just excited about our job and excited about change.”

He is soaked in Downing Street on his launch, drowned out by triumphant Blair’s anthem, his MPs are fleeing the battlefield and he visits a Titanic museum. When you think things cannot get worse for Rishi Sunak, they do. Is this the worst start to an election campaign in history?

Those with a distant memory can recall Michael Foot’s 1983 election campaign for Labour with the manifesto described by the late Gerald Kaufman as “the longest suicide note in history”.

But what went down in folklore as the worst ever election campaign – one which nearly saw the destruction of Labour – may have found its match in catastrophic miscalculations and farce.

Read the full analysis from our political editor David Maddox here:

Labour and the Tories will clash over security as campaigning for the General Election enters its first full week after the Conservatives announced plans to introduce national service.

In a keynote speech ahead of polling day, Sir Keir Starmer will say that “economic security, border security, and national security” will form the “bedrock” of the party manifesto.

Meanwhile, Rishi Sunak will be hammering his message that the Conservatives will take “bold action” to deliver “a secure future for the next generation”.

The Tories have announced that all 18-year-olds would be made to undertake a form of “mandatory” national service if they are re-elected on July 4.

Teenagers would choose between taking a 12-month placement in the armed forces or “volunteer” work in their community one weekend a month for a year under the proposals.